Game details

It's a bit odd that Mario's first completely fresh appearance on the Nintendo Switch isn't a traditional run-and-jump platform game but a novel foray into the tactical RPG genre. It's even odder that Mario has to share that debut with Ubisoft's incredibly annoying (yet ostensibly popular) Rabbids. Oddest of all, Nintendo's iconic mascot largely takes a back seat to those over-the-top, screaming humanoid rabbits in the game.

Sure, Mario might get top billing in Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle. All told, though, it feels like Mario and crew were thrown into an existing Ubisoft game midway through the process. The game's plot, to the extent that it exists, uses a stolen "SupaMerge" device that literally fuses crazified Rabbids with well-known Mario antagonists like Donkey Kong and Piranha Plants, while merging "good" Rabbids with good guys like Mario, Luigi, and Peach to create completely new unholy abominations. There's also an intelligent Roomba named Beep-o that explains all this with a lot of wordy exposition that the other characters' wordless vamping for the camera can't really convey.

While Mario staples like coins and mushrooms make appearances, Ubisoft's characters and design aesthetic seem to win out most of the time. Heck, the Mario characters can't even jump without help from an ally, which is practically treasonous in a Mario game. This isn't really a knock against a title that maintains strong (if silly) visual and gameplay themes throughout. Just don't go in expecting a Mushroom Kingdom adventure in the vein of the Paper Mario or the Mario and Luigi games.

Take your positions

Anyone familiar with the positional battles in a game like XCOM, Fire Emblem, or Final Fantasy Tactics will recognize the same essential DNA in Kingdom Battle. While there are some perfunctory and simplistic coin-collecting and block-pushing puzzles forced in between the fights, the bulk of the game involves taking turns moving characters around a grid-based map so they're in place to attack the enemy while avoiding the incoming counter attacks.

Kingdom Battle does add a few interesting tweaks to the basic formula, though. Team-based movement ends up being key to the battle of positioning—if a character can reach an ally, that ally can fling them much farther than they'd normally be able to travel with a "team jump" mechanic. This introduces an interesting push-and-pull dynamic to movement: you want to keep your characters grouped close enough to take advantage of team jumps but not so close that you can be easily surrounded or hit with explosive effects.

Which... which one is the real Peach? Who can say?!

Hoppers can bounce across the field very quickly, requiring new strategies.

Poor Toad. Never catches a break.

Mario's familiar green pipes are replaced with these blobby white versions for some reason.

"Luigi is surprisingly strong with a sniper rifle" is a sentence I never expected to type.

Are... are you making fun of me?

One of the annoying block-pushing puzzles that gets in the way of more tactical battle goodness.

The "team jump" ability is key to effective positions.

Enemies like to teleport around the graveyard levels to great effect.

In some battles, the goal is just to reach a highlighted yellow goal area as quickly as possible.

The combat arenas themselves are also interesting, often forcing characters on both sides into scant cover that can be destroyed with multiple weapon hits, leaving characters vulnerable. Most stages also have long, snaking pipes that quickly transport characters from one side to the other, expanding reach and multiplying the potential for flanking and quick escapes.

The spice of life

While the basics of fights don't change much throughout Kingdom Battle, the game does a great job of introducing enough variety for things to feel fresh from beginning to end. Though most fights are just about killing enemies before getting killed yourself, the game regularly forces you to change up your strategy to escort a defenseless unit or reach a "goal" area as quickly as possible.

It seems like a new enemy type is introduced every other fight, too, and they all feel distinct from each other. Basic Ziggys focus on ranged attacks, while hoppers use their own chained jumps to flank you, and dumb-but-powerful Smashers charge toward you when hit, requiring careful timing and precise positioning of your efforts.

Later on, there are enemies with personal shields that prevent direct frontal attacks and teleporting enemies that resist your ability to easily flank them. By mixing different enemy types together with highly varied maps, and introducing frequent reinforcements in most battles, the game never feels repetitive or rote. Then there are the bosses at the end of each of the four worlds that force you to figure out how to break through their unique defenses and capabilities.

Of course there's also the usual skill tree, which lets you customize characters with special combat abilities as the game progresses: things like area-based healing, movement upgrades, or even the ability to send out explosive drone cars toward enemies. Ostensibly, this skill system lets you customize your characters to suit your own play style, and the game lets you reshuffle your points to try out new strategies easily. In practice, though, I found that some upgrade paths were much more powerful and worthwhile than others.

Mario and Luigi, for instance, have "overwatch"-style attacks that send sure-to-hit sniper shots at any enemy that moves through their large field of view. By the end of the game, I was able to power up these attacks to hit multiple times in a single go, with strong enough force to take out most enemies that wandered into their path and a quick enough recharge time to use the ability every other turn. This kind of "throw overwhelming damage at the enemies" option in the skill tree usually worked well enough to power through almost any battle, especially when paired with the least bit of defensive support from a character like Rabbid Peach.

Flip a coin

For all the trappings of the tactical RPG system that Kingdom Battle captures, overall it feels a bit like a simplified, forgiving, and increasingly luck-based take on the punishing nature of other examples from the genre. The game seems designed to introduce newcomers to the basics of the genre rather than really tax experienced players with a real test of survival.

Take the cover system. In XCOM, a complex series of factors like shooter aim, enemy defense, and total weapon range determine your chance to hit with any attack. In Kingdom Battle, every attack either has a 100-percent chance of hitting (for characters out in the open), a 0-percent chance (for characters protected by cover), or a 50-percent chance (for enemies hiding behind smaller "half-cover").

On the one hand, it's nice being absolutely assured that you'll be able to hit most enemies if you're able to get them flanked and in range of one of those "100-percent" attacks. On the other hand, too much of the flow of a battle can often depend on those "50-percent" coin flips working for you or your opponent. On top of that, most weapons on both sides have a small (20 to 50 percent) chance of doing "critical" damage, which also adds a disruptive status effect on hitting: restricted movement, forced movement to a new location, blocked attacks, or special techniques, etc.

I ran into many situations in Kingdom Battle where a battle that was completely in hand was ruined by a few lucky shots from the opposing team that completely decimated my team. On the other side, there were battles where a few early lucky shots on my side made the fight much easier than it should have been. This isn't helped by inconsistent balancing of battle difficulty that can see one battle take an hour's worth of restarts followed by another that's easily finished in one 10-minute run.

It's easy to restart a battle and try again when things go wrong, since death isn't permanent, and the game frequently heals your characters back to full strength (and you can cycle to fresh combatants even if some were damaged in a recent battle). Still, it's frustrating when a randomized dice roll ruins or bolsters your strategy, rather than skillful planning. This is especially true if you're trying to get through the battles with "perfect" ratings, which requires finishing quickly with all your characters alive to gain additional in-game bonuses.

Baby's first XCOM

Despite the simplified gameplay and inconsistent challenge, I found myself surprisingly engaged throughout Kingdom Battle. Though the game doesn't have the depth of strategy or white-knuckle, do-or-die difficulty of the popular tactical RPGs that have come before it, it still forces you to pay attention to the terrain and the abilities of your allies and enemies to get through effectively. Paying less than full attention to the situation can lead to careless mistakes and a forced restart, so it's a good thing that the highly varied situations will keep players interested to the end.

It's hard to believe that throwing two disparate, popular franchises into a completely new genre works as well as it does. Believe it, though: Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle is a fun and engaging introduction to the tactical RPG genre that can please neophytes and veterans alike.

The Good

Lots of variety in enemies and situations keeps things fresh.

Pipes and team jumps make for interesting positioning strategies.

Forgiving nature serves as a good genre introduction without being boring.

Strong visual design combines two disparate worlds into one.

The Bad

Lucky shots can carry you through or ruin a battle quickly.

Inconsistent difficulty balancing.

Some skills seem too powerful, especially near the endgame.

Annoying and perfunctory block-pushing puzzles in between the battles.

The Ugly

That an icon like Mario has to share billing with those annoying screaming rabbits.

Verdict: An engaging, lighthearted introduction to the genre that will appeal to novices and veterans. Buy it.

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Kyle Orland
Kyle is the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica, specializing in video game hardware and software. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He is based in the Washington, DC area. Emailkyle.orland@arstechnica.com//Twitter@KyleOrl

... So you can mod out all the rabbids and play a decent tactical rpg!

I'll say what I said during the least article about this game. It'll be a solid game with a surprising amount of fun and depth (in that it'll be larger than you expect). It won't be the greatest game ever, but it'll be good enough to be counted as a success. I'd be willing to bet that it will even be a success in sales.

It will never cease to amaze me how good Nintendo is at turning the stupidest, left field ideas into enjoyable games.

I'm a big fan of the X-Com series, and the only negative thing I've heard about the game from friends is that it's a bit too easy. Take that with a grain of salt though, some of these people play Xcom/2 on Legendary Ironman, so their views are a bit skewed.

Looks like a fun game. Yet another reason to try to get a Switch. Actually this is what makes a Nintendo console stand out from the competition: for the most part they focus on fun, instead of simply trying for a specs arms race.

BTW I see Mario get that gun, in the trailer, and suddenly I am thinking of a Mario version of Portal? Though, I am not sure Valve would go for it?

"Verdict: An engaging, lighthearted introduction to the genre that will appeal to novices and veterans. Buy it."

But where do I obtain this mythical "Switch"? I've been hearing about it for months now, yet all the bricks-and-mortars like Target, Walmart, and Best Buy don't have any.

Yeah, buy the game, and hope that one day you'll be able to obtain the console to play it on before Nintendo stops production of the console.

Just call your local stores every few days; eventually one will tell you they are "getting a shipment tomorrow" or something along those lines. Then just call in the morning and double check, and even ask if they can set it aside. I find that the people at the stores are willing to do this if you indicate "I'll be there in 25 minutes", even if it's technically not store policy. I got mine this way at a Walmart about 10 days into searching for one.

"Verdict: An engaging, lighthearted introduction to the genre that will appeal to novices and veterans. Buy it."

But where do I obtain this mythical "Switch"? I've been hearing about it for months now, yet all the bricks-and-mortars like Target, Walmart, and Best Buy don't have any.

Yeah, buy the game, and hope that one day you'll be able to obtain the console to play it on before Nintendo stops production of the console.

Just call your local stores every few days; eventually one will tell you they are "getting a shipment tomorrow" or something along those lines. Then just call in the morning and double check, and even ask if they can set it aside. I find that the people at the stores are willing to do this if you indicate "I'll be there in 25 minutes", even if it's technically not store policy. I got mine this way at a Walmart about 10 days into searching for one.

Or just walk into a WalMart to get some essentials, and walk out with an unplanned Switch... like I did Saturday.

X Com give it to yaWhat?Rabbids wait for you to get it on your ownMario deliver to yaKnock Knock open up the game it's realwith the non-stop pop-pop of stainless steelNot hard getting busy with itBut it's partly kind of luck based It'll make a Kyle wonder if he did itDarn right Kyle did it and he'll do it againcause he is right and he's got the skills to winCollect coins with the enemyBut no matter how many coins you collect, he will break them for sending heYou rabbids never wanted nothing but your life saved,Peach says that's for a light dayIt's a me MarioLike Luigi said "Freeze!"but won't be the one ending up on YoshiPeach please!If the only thing you rabbids did is come out to play,stay out my way

First we gonna rock, then we gonna rollThen we let it pop, don't let it go.Xcom give it to ya,Mario give it to yaXcom give it to yaRabbids'll give it to ya

Looks like a fun game. Yet another reason to try to get a Switch. Actually this is what makes a Nintendo console stand out from the competition: for the most part they focus on fun, instead of simply trying for a specs arms race.

BTW I see Mario get that gun, in the trailer, and suddenly I am thinking of a Mario version of Portal? Though, I am not sure Valve would go for it?

Initial reaction: :groan:

After two seconds: Oh my god, a Mario platformer with a Portal gun would be amazing.

If you buy something from the king of abusive DRM, Ubisoft, you are actively hurting the gaming ecosystem.

Ars continues to hire clueless "journalists".

I've been here a long time. It's hard to leave; it's getting easier with every article.

No...if you buy one of those games with the abusive DRM, you're contributing. If you buy one without it, even from Ubisoft, you're actually helping. If you want them to stop, then reward them for the good behavior too (i.e. don't hold back on buying a good game from them without the DRM). Show them there's money in less obnoxious DRM schemes and they'll take the bait.

Looks like a fun game. Yet another reason to try to get a Switch. Actually this is what makes a Nintendo console stand out from the competition: for the most part they focus on fun, instead of simply trying for a specs arms race.

BTW I see Mario get that gun, in the trailer, and suddenly I am thinking of a Mario version of Portal? Though, I am not sure Valve would go for it?

Initial reaction: :groan:

After two seconds: Oh my god, a Mario platformer with a Portal gun would be amazing.

Looks like a fun game. Yet another reason to try to get a Switch. Actually this is what makes a Nintendo console stand out from the competition: for the most part they focus on fun, instead of simply trying for a specs arms race.

BTW I see Mario get that gun, in the trailer, and suddenly I am thinking of a Mario version of Portal? Though, I am not sure Valve would go for it?

This was the only game I pre-order during E3 this year, for any consol. Generally I pre-order a dozen or so, see what I'm getting for free later and cancel if the game looks like it's going to flop. But this year ... this was about the only thing that even made my Radar.

And before you ask ... I had Odyssey and Xenoblades pre-ordered LONG before E3